The Final Sequence

Comparing the Judgment of the Nations and the Great White Throne Judgment

In the previous chapters on the Judgment of the Nations and the Great White Throne Judgment, I showed from the Scripture the details of each. The purpose of this short chapter is to compare and contrast those details.

In what ways do these two great judgments agree in their details?

The main detail is that the Lord Christ is the Judge in both cases, as the following texts make clear:

Mat 25.31
But when the Son of Man comes in His glory, and all the angels with Him, then He will sit on His glorious throne.
[There can be no doubt that the Lord Christ is referring to Himself here.]

Note how the Apostle John refers to the Father here:

Rev 1.8
“I am the Alpha and the Omega,” says the Lord God, “who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty.”

and in the same manner to the Lord Christ here:

Rev 22.13
I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end.

But note especially these words of the Lord Christ about the topic of the responsibility of judgment:

Joh 5.22,26-27
For not even the Father judges anyone, but He has given all judgment to the Son … For just as the Father has life in Himself, even so He gave to the Son also to have life in Himself; and He gave Him authority to execute judgment, because He is the Son of Man
[“All judgment” must include the last judgment of Rev 20, or words cease to have meaning.]

That One who is the Alpha and Omega, that One who is the Son of Man, is the One who will sit in judgment of all mankind, the living and the dead!

A second detail in which the two judgments are the same is that both consign those condemned to the Outer Darkness permanently.

Mat 25.45-46 [to those on His left at the Judgment of the Nations]
Then He will answer them, ‘Truly I say to you, to the extent that you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to Me.’ These will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”

Rev 20.14-15 [to the lost dead at the Great White Throne Judgment]
Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire. And if anyone’s name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire.

In what ways do the judgments differ in their details?

In all other ways, these judgments are very different:

There can be no conclusion other than the fact that the Judgment of the Nations and the Great White Throne Judgment are two very different events that have the same result: those condemned are consigned to the Outer Darkness for eternity.